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2018 PAC 52 / TP 52 Season Gets Rolling

2018 Season for PAC 52's begins with exciting news as established TP 52's join in the fun with an expanding regatta curriculum!

On February 10 & 11 the Pac52 Class will meet TP52’s from the West Coast of the USA and Mexico on the starting line at SCYA Midwinters at SDYC. As of publishing time, seven teams were entered with a handful more reporting their intent to compete.

The regatta will showcase a meeting of 52’s, both new and old, and will feature dual scoring awarding trophies for both line honors and ORR handicap.

52’ Midwinters is a collaboration between the Acapulco TP52 fleet, the Pac52 Class and the various West Coast US based 52’s. Conceived of late last year, this serves as a pre-season warm up event for the Pac52 Class as well as a feeder regatta for the Puerto Vallarta Race. Two days of racing in the San Diego sunshine should bring camaraderie and competition to the waters off the coast of San Diego.

Interlodge Joins Pac 52 Cup:

We have an exciting 2018 as we join the Pac 52 class this summer in California. Interlodge 6, is the 2015 King Marine built Gazprom, designed by Botin Partners. This will be our 4th boat from Botin Partners and we look forward to working with them once again on the optimization. Interlodge 4 (Botin 44) will campaign in New England for 2018 season.

Interlodge joins the Pac52 Class!

Team Interlodge Owner Austin Fragomen of New York Yacht Club has confirmed that Interlodge will join
the Pac52 Class in 2018. The Yacht, newly named “Interlodge VI”, is the former Bronosec TP52 which
was designed by Botin Partners and was built by King Marine in 2015. Interlodge VI is the same hull
design as the Pac52 “Fox”. Interlodge will join Fox, Invisible Hand, BadPak, Rio and Gladiator/Land
Rover BAR for the Pac52 Class 2018 Season.

Austin and wife Gwen @ 2016 Key West Race Week

Austin Fragomen started sailing while growing up in Illinois and then after school moved to New York
and began sailing J/24s, Swan 42s and then TP52s in the 52 Super Series. Austin has sailed on the
West Coast but never with one of his own yachts and he is looking forward to racing with the Pac52
Class because of it’s “convenient location” in California. Austin’s wife, Gwen Fragomen, regularly sails
with the team and the yacht’s captain is Kris Matthews who has been with Team Interlodge for 10
years.

The first Pac52 Class regatta for Team Intelodge will be Yachting Cup at San Diego Yacht Club in May.
For more information about Interlodge and the Pac52 Class please view our website atwww.Pac52Class.com
Julie Servais, Pac52 Class Manager

Raising The BAR For West Coast 52' Sailing

Land Rover BAR, the British America's Cup team will race with Tony Langley's British sailing team Gladiator, to compete on the TP52 Racing circuit as Land Rover BAR Gladiator.

The newly formed team is gearing up for its racing debut, the SCYA Midwinter Regatta in San Diego on the 10th - 11th February. They will spend the week training on the race course ahead of the weekend's racing.

Sir Ben Ainslie and Tony Langley will lead the team with Langley at the helm. Many of the crew that represented Land Rover BAR at the 35th America's Cup competition in Bermuda last summer will be racing, including Sailing Team Manager Jono Macbeth and the British Olympic Finn gold medallist from Rio 2016, Giles Scott.

Giles Scott recently returned to the Finn class, winning the 2018 World Cup Series Miami, USA with a day to spare. David Carr (grinder), Matt Cornwell (bow), Nick Hutton (mid-bow), and Andy McLean (navigator) will also be aboard from the AC35 crew.

Geoff Povey will return as grinder from last season's Gladiator crew, alongside Andrew Escourt (main) and Tom Wilson (pit); with Jono Swain (downwind trim) and two times America's Cup winner Joey Newton (trim) joining the team for the circuit.

Land Rover BAR Gladiator training on the Solent

Land Rover BAR Team Principal and Skipper, Ben Ainslie, commented; "With the return to monohull racing for the America's Cup, the TP52 class provides a good opportunity and a competitive environment for us to get out racing and to retain some of our core sailing team alongside trying out new team members.

"We had a good first training session with Tony and the team towards the end of 2017 - here in the Solent - and we are looking forward to our first racing event together in San Diego.

"We're going into the events - and the TP52 Super Series - with our eyes open, we all appreciate just how tough the competition is. There are several experienced teams who have been competing at this level for years - and we are also expecting some of the other America's Cup Challengers to enter."

Land Rover BAR Gladiator will return to San Diego for the NOOD Regatta on the 16 - 18th March before going on to race in the 52 Super Series - the leading high performance monohull racing circuit - with the opener taking place 23 - 27th May in Sibenik, Croatia. While two events in the UK, the Round the Island Race (7th July) and Lendy Cowes Week (4 - 11th August) will offer the British team an opportunity to race on home waters.

Quick catch up with Coach, Rob Wilson
“It’s important for us to get back into cutting edge monohull racing, getting the team working together and thinking about tactics and strategy”
Land Rover BAR Gladiator ready to race the SCYA Mid-Winter Regatta

A Nine Horse Grand Prix Mid-Winter Weekend At SDYC

Kelly Holthus is all grins as he takes the wheel aboard PAC 52 BadPak during Saturday's racing
in San Diego. Yeah, THAT IS Sir Ben Ainslie's he is racing....

Nine 52's lines up this weekend for the SoCal Yachting Association's Midwinters along 6 Beneteau 36'.7s
for 5 races over 2 days hosted by the San Diego Yacht Club. A low pressure system brought clouds and a 12-16 knot southerly with lumpy seas
on Saturday with bright sun and flat seas and 8-13 knots of wind for Sunday. The fleet consisted of variety of PAC 52's, and TP 52's
all racing under handicap as well as a line honor results just for the halibut.

For the record, the cooperation of these West Coast 52's is a jumpstart for a quickly developing class
to gather and work out the kinks as well as showcase this grand prix class for its potential. For the
3 Acapulco boats, Vincitore, Patches and Nimbus, it presents a chance for tuning up before the Mexican races
and get some work in before they begin. For the The Pac 52's, BadPak, Rio, and Invisible Hand, an opportunity
to prep for another full season in the Pac 52' Cup Circuit,
(Fox is currently undergoing modifications in Mission Bay in preps for upcoming season)
For Dale Williams's TP52' (nee BUD) and David Team's TP52' Vesper (he used to own Rebel Yell) it was a chance to see
how the boats and crews were competitively and see if their boats can be altered to fit the PAC 52 rule.

The racing was tight all weekend with 4 different boats taking line honor bullets, but only Gladiator/Land Rover BAR
taking 2 of them. And then there was the carnage, to which no on seemed immune. Patches losing a jib halyard
on day on then ripped main on day 2, Nimbus went through 2 jibs and a main, both Rio and BAR shrimped their kites,
Invisible Hand had a forestay fitting part at the mast and was fortunate to have the jib up, which kept the mast up, during
race one on Saturday. "We were lucky on that" Said owner Frank Slootman " But we got two great days of practice in
on Thursday and Friday before it broke, so it wasn't a total loss. Vesper lost its D2 support in race 4 on Sunday after 3 great
races Saturday where the corrected out with 3 bullets. Rio hit Nimbus (nee old Rio TP52) and did some stanchion damage and both
RIO and BAR were over early in one race and manages to sail their way back to the top to finish 1st and 2nd.

With Interlodge joining the fleet soon and another yet to be named Super Series boat coming out of the
Great Lakes with America's Cup crew to utilize this west coast series alongside Gladiator/ Land Rover BAR,
The fleet is growing rapidly. Not to mention that many of the 2-3 year old Super Series boats are on the market
as their teams get the latest generation for the Med Circuit, the potential for additional grow looms for fence sitters
to join in at a reduced cost!